Audio-Visuals

GEORGE HARRISON: THE DARK HORSE YEARS 1976-1992
Directed by various
(Dark Horse/Capitol)
While not a unified whole, George Harrison: The Dark Horse Years 1976-1992 is still a useful collection for diehard fans of the late rock legend. Though the title gives the impression that this DVD is a documentary about Harrison's record company Dark Horse, that portion is less than ten minutes long. The bulk of the disk is taken up by a set of videos. Most American fans are familiar with the Cloud Nine-era clips for "Got My Mind Set on You" and "When We Was Fab," both of which engage in as much visual trickery as was possible in the days before computer graphics. Neither come off as groundbreaking art, but they hold up reasonably well, especially the cameo-ridden "When We Was Fab." What's more interesting for the hardcore, however, are the lesser-known videos, including cuts for "This is Love," "Faster" (Harrison's ode to Formula One racing), "Crackerbox Palace" and "This Song" (his commentary on his plagarism trial for "My Sweet Lord"). The latter two date from the mid-70s and proudly display Harrison's penchant for Monty Pythonesque humor. There's even a different version of "Got My Mind Set on You" featuring teenagers, arcade games and blinding 80s fashions. The rest of the disk's contents consists of concert clips from his early 90s Japanese tour, in which he looks game but uncomfortable, despite some stinging slide guitar on "Cloud Nine," and some puzzling pieces devoted to the songs he contributed to the disastrous film Shanghai Surprise, which was produced by his own Handmade Films. There's little here casual fans can't live without, but the faithful will clasp this breathlessly to the bosom. Michael Toland [buy it]